Martyrs and Thieves
by Rainfallen
Summary: -on indefinite hiatus- "I will not stand beside Loghain. And neither should you." Four years after Anora is crowned and Warden Loghain ends the Blight, there is a stir surrounding an unexpected arrival at the Grey Wardens' stronghold of Highever.
1. A place in the darkness

**Standard disclaimers apply: All things related to or contained in Dragon Age: Origins, recognizable or no, belong to EA, Bioware, and the genius of one Mr. Gaider.  
****Story title comes from a largely unrelated song by recording artist Jennifer Knapp. **

**A/N: ****I think the events leading to this situation are fairly clear, but my mind can be a murky place at times so I could be mistaken. If you are confused feel free to message me, ask in a review, or just wait for more to be revealed. =) Thank you for reading!**

* * *

**A PLACE IN THE DARKNESS**

--

The heavy pounding on her door wakes her, and the vestiges of a mildly unsettling dream slip away like water between her fingers, leaving only faint, uneasy traces behind. There is only a hint of light flickering through the small window, with the wavering dimness of a torch. Not yet morning, then. She groans and shoves herself out of bed, her footsteps matching the urgent staccato knocking.

She lifts the latches with fingers slowed by sleep and tugs the banded oaken door open. Simeon's heavy, mailed fist is still suspended in the air, mid-knock. "An attack? I didn't hear the alarm," she rasps, squinting at him.

"No, Lady, not an attack." He seems to struggle with the proper word for a moment. "A – a visitor?"

Elissa crosses her arms, trying to shake the sleep out of and the commander into her head. "A visitor? At... whatever forsaken hour it might be?" She exhales, trying to hide her annoyance. "Just - put him in a room and in the morning I'll-"

"If I may, Lady," the young Warden interrupts with a pained expression, "Edgard has thrown him in the dungeon and sent me to request your presence. I think he wants your leave to... dispose of the man immediately."

Elissa rubs a palm over her face vigorously, biting back a curse. "_What_? Who is - and why did Edgard - oh, damn the man, I don't care. We aren't the sodding Chantry or some Korcari edgeland sheriffs!" She glances down at the loose roughspun clothes she threw on for bed, and at her bare toes wriggling a greeting up at her. She sighs. "Let me find my boots. I will be down straight away."

"Yes ma'am." Simeon darts away, mail jingling and scabbard clanking noisily against his leg.

"Don't let Edgard kill him!" Elissa calls after him before ducking back into her room.

"I won't!"

She sticks her head out again. "Tell him there is to be no thumb-hanging or poking holes in non-vital bits, either!"

"Right," he shouts back before rounding the far corner.

Elissa splashes her face with frigid water from her basin with a hiss and after a moment opts for putting on more than her boots.

Minutes later she stomps down the narrow stone steps beneath the castle's main hall, cold fingers straightening the hastily fastened straps of her leather jerkin before returning to rest habitually on the hilt of the blade at her waist. Two of the guards stand at the bottom of the stair; each moves quickly aside to allow her to pass.

"Lady," Edgard exclaims, striding forward as she descends. "He is come, here to us, daring to walk, head high, up to these very gates!" The grizzled Orlesian is as agitated as she has ever seen him, his strange speech patterns more prevalent than usual as the scant torchlight cuts harsh shadows across his deeply lined face and sets his dark eyes ablaze. Simeon stands behind him and lifts his hands in a helpless shrug.

"Edgard," she chides, "Calm yourself! What is going on here? Who have you-"

"The deserter! Coward! Absconder! Apostate Warden!" Edgard's voice rises with each word until he bellows the last, turning to point at the line of barred cells along the far wall of the dank room. Elissa wonders, not for the first time, if her father ever housed his own prisoners in these cells. She turns her thoughts away before they can linger too long on the chains and manacles set too high in the stone walls, or the old stains, seeping darkness in unpleasant patterns, all draining downwards.

"Redundancy," she mutters, irritated, and pushes past Edgard to see for herself what manner of poor sot saw fit to infiltrate her keep in the dead of night and rouse Edgard in such a way. "I'm sure there's a... reasonable... explanation...."

Her voice trails off.

The prisoner's wide shoulders are hunched over, bones protruding sharply, and he leans against the bars of his cells as though for support. The rust from the bars has smudged his fingers a rich sienna, reminiscent of dried blood, and the eyes that he raises to look into hers are deep set in an almost unrecognizably gaunt face.

Almost.

But she would know those eyes _anywhere_.

"Elissa." He speaks the word and it is strangely familiar to her, but she can't quite connect the disjoint sounds with their meaning. The blood is roaring in her ears and every frenzied survival instinct she has ever experienced is activating as one in a heady rush. Her body is _cold_, ice settling in her stomach and lodged in her throat, but her face is burning, burning.

"Or perhaps not," she whispers.

"Do not speak her name, whelp!" Edgard growls, hulking over to Elissa's side menacingly.

"Edgard," she says firmly, a reprimand. She does not look away from the prisoner.

"Is it not the one, Lady?" Edgard asks at her elbow, like an overeager barn cat presenting her with a lovingly mauled rat as a prize. "He admitted his treachery upon introductions. 'I am Alistair,' he boasted, 'And I am a Grey Warden.' He dared – dared to claim the brotherhood and cheapen our ranks by association! 'You know who I am?' he asked me, as though I could forget that name. We do not forget. We must hold this deserter up as an example of how the Grey Wardens punish those who abandon their duty!"

The echo of the words, dropping like hard stones from his lips, shakes her even now.

_Name him a Warden and you cheapen us all... I will not stand beside him and neither should you... This man abandoned our brothers... How can you simply forget that... I'm leaving... I don't want anything to do with this place or any of you people. Ever. _

"Edgard," she says, her tone unchanged. "Return to your post."

"Return - but, Lady?" he protests, bewildered, his belligerence wilting almost instantly beneath her words.

"Your – post." she grits out between clenched teeth, and he leaves without further protest, more hurt and worried than truly indignant. But she will deal with him later.

"Simeon," she says sharply, and he jumps to attention in an instant. "Move this man to one of the empty bunks on the first floor. Put some water in the basin, a change of clothes if you can find some, and for the love of Andraste, see that he gets some food."

"Of course," Simeon replies, already moving to unfasten the heavy lock holding the thick latches of the cell in place.

"Erik," she barks to one of the guards at the steps, her gaze still never breaking from her prisoner's eyes, "You are on second watch, are you not?" Without waiting for a response, she continues, "Go with them and post yourself outside the door. I will send someone to relieve you at the end of your shift. See that he does not leave the room, and that no one other than Simeon enters it without my express permission. Especially Edgard," she tacks on as a weary afterthought before finally turning away.

"As you say, Lady," Erik affirms, and they bustle around her to do as she commands.

Simeon guides the man she once knew out of the cell and turns to Elissa before slamming the cell door closed once more. "If we have need of you...?" he asks leadingly.

"I'll be in my rooms," she says flatly. She turns on the large heel of her combat boots and trudges back up the stairs.


	2. Harsh hope against time

**Standard disclaimers still apply. **

* * *

**HARSH HOPE AGAINST TIME**

--

She doesn't go back to sleep.

When dawn breaks, the light crests through the window and catches on the bevy of blades she has spread out across her desk, each painstakingly cleaned and sharpened to a keen edge. Her brindled leather battle armor, hanging neatly on its stand, shows the faint sheen of a recent oiling, and, in perhaps the most telling sign of her state of mind, she has sorted the numerous documents, letters, and notes once scattered haphazardly about the study and moved them into neat stacks and piles on her shelves.

Out of menial tasks and swiftly running out of time, she stands at the small window and broods like a champion. The distraction method of coping is clearly not working.

_This is absurd_.

She is the commander of the Fereldan Grey Wardens, infamous in the order, deadly with a blade, deft with her fingers, a terror when angered, cool on the battlefield, and a born leader. But this? This is as alien to her as holding another man's blade in her hand, as unknowable as the Fade. What is she supposed to _do_ with this?

She has spent _years_ honing her thoughts and retraining her emotions, carefully chiseling away at the anger and hurt, until the edges of the jagged hole he'd left in her were smoothed over, blending seamlessly with the others (labeled 'Father,' 'Mother,' 'Fergus,' 'Wynne'...) unless you looked too closely.

_That's _quite_ enough, you morose fool, _she thinks viciously.

Suddenly furious –although with herself or with _him_ or with the Maker-forsaken circumstances, she cannot say– she stalks from her quarters and makes her way to the kitchens. _Tea_, she tells herself. _Whiskey this early in the day will lead to nothing good_. A small cluster of the newest initiates are gathered about one of the tables, harassing Cook, and Simeon is emerging from one of the storage closets, clutching the bag of tea leaves that had been Elissa's objective. He looks like a child caught with his hand in a cookie jar, and she is struck by how _young_ he still is, though it was only a handful of years ago when it might have been _her_ caught red-handed in this very kitchen.

"There are easier ways to kill me than poisoning my tea, you know," she informs him wryly.

"Oh – I don't know. Far away from your blades this way, you see?" He beams winningly and she sighs.

"What _are_ you doing? You hate tea." The initiates at the table are watching them in amusement, more younger brothers than subordinates in moments like these, and she can feel the irritation seeping away from her unwillfully.

"Well I thought I'd – try – to see what, ah, what _you_ see in this stuff?" He shakes the bag at her questioningly. "And if I found I still didn't like it, of course, well, the leftovers could... erm. Well." Simeon looks decidedly sheepish, and she finds herself wondering what, precisely, he has been up to since she left him.

It doesn't take much guessing.

_Stupid, stupid_. She should have anticipated this. He is just a boy yet, and fascinated with the tales of the vastly more remarkable times that came before his recruitment. Of course he would be intrigued by their midnight 'visitor.' And what was there to be done about it? If it's _his_ intention to stay, she can hardly expect to keep him isolated from the rest of the Wardens forever.

_If it's his intention to stay?_ her thoughts screech at her, incredulous. _Would you really allow that? Do you give a damn what he _intends_?_

"Simeon," she says wearily, plucking the bag from his fingers and turning to take a mug from the large shelves of earthenware on the wall. "If he wants tea, you can take him some sodding tea. I don't care."

The kettle over one of the large fires is still almost full with steaming water, and she inhales the vapors deeply as she pours it over the leaves.

Simeon turns a mug over and over in his hands, watching her with his bottom lip caught between his teeth. When she sets down the kettle he doesn't pick it up, but instead takes a step closer to her and drops his voice below the growing din from the tables behind him. "Is it true, what they're saying?" he asked. "That he was with you at the battle of Ostagar – that he deserted when you pardoned Loghain?"

She counts to ten before answering. "It was hardly a pardon. The situation was desperate and so were we. You know how deadly the Joining can be – that alone might have killed him. But we were so few, and better he die battling the demon than uselessly on the floor of the courts."

"So tragic," Simeon murmurs. "An old hero gone so wrong – and then redeeming himself and saving the nation after all."

Elissa can think of a few other words for it, but she doesn't feel the pressing urge to share. "Don't romanticize it," she says sharply. "He was a traitor, and it was due largely to his desertion of us at Ostagar that the Blight was not wiped out then. We could have been spared months of destruction and Maker-knows how many thousands of lives if he had simply stood with us when it mattered."

"Yes, of course," he assents, subdued for just a moment before eagerly returning to his original line of questioning, "But this man, this Alistair? He left because you recruited Loghain, is that true? They say that he was the old king's bastard son, and that you and he were—"

"Enough of this," she snaps, snatching the cup from Simeon's startled hands and preparing the tea herself. "It is a story for your history lessons with Riell, not the breakfast table." She stirs the drink with a bit more force than necessary, welcoming the hot bite on her fingers as some of the liquid sloshes over the brim.

"But it was just a few years ago – and you were _there_," he protests futilely to her retreating back.

Elissa shakes her head and leaves the kitchen silently, taking both cups of tea with her.

She does not actively think about it, nor does she really consider the path her feet take until she is standing in front of the heavy door where Erik still remains. "Good morning, ma'am," he says. "All's quiet in there."

Erik was a foot soldier in Loghain's army, she recalls, who approached her in the days following the final battle and begged to join the Wardens. He, like so many others, had lost all the family he had to the ravages of the darkspawn, but where others had let it break them, his loss instilled steel in his resolve. This could not be allowed to happen again, he had told her, and when she answered wearily that the chances of another Blight in their lifetimes was more than slim, he informed her stoically that it didn't matter. "The Wardens must be restored to their old status if we're going to prevent the future generations from being as ill-prepared as we were this time," he had said. "All I ask is to be a building block in that foundation."

The small band of Orlesian Wardens sent to aid in rebuilding Ferelden's own force, led by veteran Warden Edgard, arrived in Denerim some weeks later. When Elissa took command and guided them to the old home that was to become their stronghold, Erik traveled with them, her first recruit. She is blessed, she thinks briefly, to be surrounded by so many intrinsically _good_ men.

Elissa nods an acknowledgement with a smile and jerks her head back in the direction from which she came. "Thank you. It's close enough to the shift change – go on to the kitchen and get something to eat. I'll take it from here."

"Of course." To his credit, he doesn't question her, but he does cast a curious glance behind him as he departs. She knows very well that this is moving swiftly past odd, and that the rumors are already flying is not an encouraging thought. _But what is there to be done about it_? she thinks for a second time, and pushes open the door.

--

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**Yes, we will see Alistair next chapter, I promise. I expect it to go up some time this evening. **


	3. In the absence of martyrs

**Standard disclaimers still apply.**

* * *

**IN THE ABSENCE OF MARTYRS**

--

He looks so _tired_.

He isn't sleeping, and she brushes aside the vague impression of disappointment. It would have been nice to have a moment to gather her thoughts, to look without being seen, to have the advantage over him for just a moment. But Elissa has seen him sleeping many times before, and – _that_ train of thought is nipped very neatly in the bud, _thank_ you very much.

He is sitting on the edge of one of the low beds on the far side of the long, narrow dormitory, hunched over with his head in his hands. She is briefly pleased to see that Simeon was able to find clean clothes that fit him, but that pleasure is quickly replaced by horror at how much thinner he looks. What in the name of the holy prophet has he been _doing_ with himself?

_Focus, _she tells herself. She keeps her steps slow and even as she approaches, uncertainty clawing at her stomach like a wet cat. He stiffens a little as she draws close, then drops his hands to his lap and raises his head. His eyes lock on her boots as she stops in front of him, then slide up slowly, lingering a moment on the warm mug she holds out to him before finally looking up to her face.

Fixing him with what she hopes is an impassive gaze, she bounces the proffered mug very slightly in the air. "Here," she says. "I put in extra honey."

After a moment he takes the cup gingerly, without breaking eye contact, and she cannot shake the relief that blossoms in her chest when his fingers do not brush hers. His stare is relentless, but this she understands, this she can _do_. Elissa has never lost a staring contest in this castle, be it with Fergus, Father, or Dog, and she has no intention of starting now.

Her victory doesn't take long, and she is once again vaguely disappointed. _When did you become so childish?_ she chides herself as Alistair drops his eyes and finally drinks deeply from the tea.

After a moment he balances the cup carefully on an open palm and stares at it. "Why?" he whispers hoarsely, the second word he's spoken to her in twice as many years.

She isn't sure what he's asking - _Why did you spare Loghain? Why do you remember how I like my tea? Why did you call off your pet warhound of a Warden last night? Why am I shut away in this room like a prisoner? Why is all not sunshine and thrice-damned roses? _

She also doesn't care. She's suddenly _angry _once more, and how _dare_ he?

"No," she says. "You don't get to ask the questions here."

He gives a humorless bark of a laugh. "I see. I'm in no position to argue, now am I?" he asks softly, looking back up at her through a fringe of hair grown slightly too long.

She can't read his expression or his tone, and she sets her own cup down on one of the plain bedside tables and twists her fingers together behind her back before he can notice how hard her hands are shaking.

"Why are you here, Alistair?" she asks plainly.

He smiles a little grimly. "Because I have nowhere else to be."

Elissa makes an impatient sound in her throat. "You've clearly had somewhere else to be for the past four years. And you certainly seemed to be in a hurry to get there when you tucked tail and ran out on us day before the battle with the blighted hordes of darkspawn and the maker-damned _ARCHDEMON; _have you forgotten?" Her voice is escalating, and the vitriol and bitterness in her tone sound harsh even to her own ears.

Alistair shoves himself to his feet with more force than necessary and stands uncomfortably close to her, defensiveness and a hint of anger evident in his expression. "It wasn't like that and you know it," he growls down at her. "It was rash and it was a mistake, I can't deny that now, but it was a matter of honor at–"

"Oh, the _abyss_ take your honor!" she bursts out. "Honor didn't hold you to your vows, did it? Honor didn't keep you in Denerim when there were _three_ of us against that monster, did it? Deserting us wasn't _honorable_, Alistair! It was cowardice and damn well near treason!"

"Then why didn't you just kill me and be done with it?" he shouts back. "The Wardens tolerate no _cowardice_," -he spat the word out as though it were distasteful- "as you saw firsthand at your Joining! Why did you bar my execution? Why invoke your right to a boon from the queen to save a _deserter_?"

"Because I _needed_ you! Your _country_ needed you and you just – _left _– and – _oh_!" She stops with a groan of frustration. There is an edge of hysteria creeping into her voice and traitorous tears are threatening to spill, and she will be _damned_ if she sheds another tear over him or this mess he created. She turns her back to him and presses the heels of her hands to her eyes, trying to regain her composure and steady her breathing.

Only then she can't breathe at all, because his hands are suddenly hard on her shoulders and he is spinning her about, pulling her body roughly to his, and crushing her against him with an air of desperation. His arms are so tight around her that it hurts and the hot stirring of his ragged breath in her hair makes her chest hitch with a dry sob. It shouldn't still feel so _familiar_ and it certainly shouldn't feel so _right_. She had thought the memories damn well banished, but her body remembers –oh, it remembers– and for a few seconds she is _lost_.

"I know, I know," he says miserably. "Just please... stop. Stop... and…"

His voice is too close and his hands on her back are too intimate and it is just too _much_. Elissa shoves her hands against his chest hard, pushing him away with all her strength. She can feel his skin slipping loosely over the ribs beneath her fingers and she remembers: this is what heartbreak feels like.

"No. Don't – touch – me," she grinds out, taking two unsteady steps back and ignoring that _look_ on his face. "It is inappropriate and unwanted."

For several long moments the harsh sounds of their uneven breath are the only break in the stillness. Then Alistair eases himself slowly back down on the edge of the bed, his movements slow and shaky like those of a much older man. He drops his face back into his hands for a moment. "I'm sorry, Elissa," he says, his voice muffled and echoing strangely through his palms. "You have no idea how sorry."

She sighs long and slow, unsure how to respond. It is neither that simple nor that easy, and they both know it. There is no guidebook for this, no protocol she can follow.

"What am I supposed to do with you?" she whispers.

"Whatever you like," he says, his voice free of implication. "I've been fighting this pull for too long. I don't know. I don't care. Your men, the big one at least, would see me strung up as a deserter. I can't argue with you if you trust his word. He's an old-timer, maybe that's the way of things at Weisshaupt. We're both–"

"Don't be ridiculous," she interrupts. "I'm not saying that the urge to have your head wasn't powerfully strong once upon a time, but I'm not going to kill you, Alistair. If that is the way at Weisshaupt – well, this is not Weisshaupt. And Edgard talks loudly... and certainly has his own ideas... but at the end of the day he will follow my lead, as will every other man in this fortress. To be honest, if you were anyone else... well, I don't think he would have reacted quite so strongly. At times I'm afraid he sees me more as a surrogate daughter than his commander, and he can be... protective."

Alistair looks at her strangely for a moment. "What exactly did you tell him about me?"

Elissa makes a sound very like an indignant snort. "We weren't exactly discreet, Alistair," she says severely. " And after all the nobility at the landsmeet saw and heard, by the time Edgard and the other Orlesian Wardens arrived, the rumors were rampant. The entire capital knew what the two of us were about – everyone who had seen us together. And," she mutters as an afterthought, "Everyone who saw me after."

"I was blindsided, Elissa," he whispers. "Angry and – and bewildered. I didn't mean to hurt you. And I never wanted – it was just – _Loghain! _I don't – I don't know even know how you could...."

"He killed the archdemon, you know," she says quietly. "After Riordan died trying."

Alistair exhales harshly, rubbing a hand over his disheveled head. "I know. Died a hero of Ferelden, bless his shriveled black heart."

"He died helping to right the wrongs he committed against us, Alistair." She scowls at his exasperated look. "He died so neither of us had to. Why is this so offensive to you?"

"Because it should have been me," he says, his voice sharp. "It should have been me fighting beside you. It should have been me who died at the keep that day. He didn't deserve the honor. He _deserved_ a traitor's death, and you gave him the opposite."

She exhales and bites back a retort. "Look," she says wearily after a moment, "We aren't going to agree on this. And frankly, I don't give two figs for your would-be pissing contest for dying rights. It happened, neither of us liked it, but we both did what we believed necessary. Now you're here, and we deal with the consequences." The words are harsh but her tone is not. She can't muster the energy to even feign anger right now.

He doesn't answer, just _looks_ at her silently.

She gives in first.

"So. We've established I'm not going to kill you. What now?"

Alistair scrubs at his face and the thin, hollowed angles still seem all wrong to Elissa. "I hadn't really thought that far ahead, to be completely honest," he admits. "Unless it is going to cause a rift amongst the men, I would – well, I would like to stay here. I'm a Warden, and I can't fight that. Just – being near others brings more peace than I've had in years." He drops his brooding gaze to the floor for a moment before looking back up with the closest thing to a smile she's seen from him yet. "And I'm rather fond of being in the sunshine and having proper food after all that time underground..."

"Underground?" she interrupts, quirking a questioning brow.

"Orzammar," he replies, and hesitates. "I'll – can we talk about this later?"

She regards him silently for a moment, then nods once. "We will," she says, but her tone emphasizes: _don't think this is over_.

"Come then. If you're to be... reinitiated, as it were, you should meet the others. The sub commanders need to know that you're here, and who you are. And there will need to be a meeting with them all later in a more official capacity to discuss the finer points of what will be expected of you. Since this is rather a special case."

She considers for a moment, and then plows ahead. She has to say it. "Alistair, when you join the Grey Wardens, you join for life. You know that. But you also must know that your loyalty will be called deeply under question."

"I know that," he says, meeting her gaze.

"I don't trust you." The words tear themselves from her throat like knives. "And no one here has any more reason to than I. I am your commander here, not your friend. I will not make this easy. You have a great deal to prove."

He doesn't falter. "Whatever it takes," he says, an odd expression twisting his jaw. "Commander."

--


	4. Interlude I

**Standard disclaimers still apply. Opening lyrics from "The Trapeze Swinger" by Iron and Wine.**

**This is the first of a few shortish interludes that will be dispersed throughout the story. **

* * *

**INTERLUDE I**

--

Please remember me  
My misery  
And how it lost me all I wanted

_--_

_His head was swimming as he lurched from the Landsmeet chamber. _

_Had she just...? No. She couldn't. She wouldn't. Not after the murder of her family. Not after the slaughter at Ostagar. Not after the Alienage. Not after all the words spoken, promises made._

_But she __**had**_, _and she __**did**__. _

_He pushed his way blindly through the crowded marketplace and ignored the greetings of the guardsmen at the city gates. Riordan's words had been a complete shock; the man might not have seen the massacre that had taken place at Ostagar, but he knew the facts. He knew what had been lost that day. Setting aside even Cailan and Duncan --two men for whose individual deaths alone Alistair would have willingly exacted bloody revenge-- an entire army and the country's entire regiment of Wardens had perished on the field that day. Thousands of deaths that could have –__**would**__ have– been prevented had Loghain not deserted them. Riordan knew all this, and still made his proposal. _

_Worst still, __**she**__ knew all this, and she accepted it. _

_Alistair stumbled over a stray root just outside the edge of their camp and landed hard on his hands and knees. For a moment he didn't move. He breathed deeply, in ragged gasps, and dug his stiff, gloved fingers into the damp earth in a desperate bid to regain control. _

_He did not know, did not care to know, what drove Loghain to his actions. Ambition, revenge, fear, or sheer madness; it made no difference to the dead men and it made no difference to Alistair. _

_He scrambled to his feet, leaving deep impressions in the ground where his hands and heavy knee guards had pressed. It took him only a moment to tear through the scant contents of his tent and the depths of the large supply chest, pulling out the absolute essentials from amongst his belongings and leaving the rest. He stood, shaking, in front of the embers of the fire, taking a mental inventory of everything he had: plain clothes, some food, the armor he wore, the shield strapped to his back, longsword at his side and dagger in his boot. The rest could stay. _

"_And what are you doing?" asked the third-last voice Alistair wanted to hear at that particular moment. _

_Son of a twelve-penny __**whore**__, he'd forgotten Zevran had stayed behind to guard the camp. Fine job he was doing, come to think of it, if he only just now noticed something amiss. But the lacking observational powers and competency of a backstabbing, effeminate elf was hardly Alistair's problem anymore. _

_He turned and fixed a glare on Zevran. "Oh, I don't know. I was at court and suddenly, somewhere between the mudslinging at the beginning and the part where Riordan and Elissa lost their Maker-forsaken minds and decided to pardon a treasonous executor of genocide at the end, I was struck by the inescapable desire to see the world. Travel, you know, because I never do that! Maybe I'll cross the sea and visit your precious Antiva. Maybe go north to the Anderfels. Oh, or maybe I'll convince the dwarves to seal me in on the business side of the deep roads. Not that it's any of your sodding business, but I don't give a __**damn**__ where I end up as long as it isn't here."_

_When Alistair's sarcasm was spent, Zevran did not look impressed. He crosses his slender arms over his chest and met Alistair glare for glare. "Are you drunk? Addled? Possessed? No? Just being a fool then. Why am I not surprised?"_

_Alistair gave a harsh, humorless laugh and turned toward the trail leading to the road. "I wouldn't expect you to understand. Little things like loyalty and honor are lost on your kind."_

_Zevran stepped into Alistair's path, his expression hard. "No, I believe I understand perfectly," he said coolly. "Things do not go your way, there is a decision of strategy made which you do not agree with, and you storm away like a spoiled child, run away from all you have fought for. Run away from your sworn duty and leave your people to their fate. Run away and leave the woman you claim to love to fight this archdemon alone, without you."_

_It took every iota of self control Alistair possessed to not hit him, to keep his clenched fists at his sides. Instead, he took a step forward and leaned in close: angry, menacing. "I won't stand by while the memories of our fallen comrades are dishonored. I won't stand by while the integrity of my Order is besmirched. And I will not call that monster my brother, when his cowardice and treason are what cost my true brethren their lives. I am __**done**__ talking to you." _

_He shouldered past the elf forcefully and strode down the pathway. _

"_Alistair, stop for a moment and __**think**__," Zevran called after him, weary. "You do not have to do this." _

_Alistair kept walking. "I have no choice."_

"_You'll break her heart," Zevran said, so quietly that the words were almost lost to the wind. _

_But Alistair heard. He stopped for just a moment, the bitterness rising like bile in his throat. "Then maybe one day we'll be even," he said, and then he was gone. _

_--_


End file.
